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Chapter Organizer- May 1, 2017

May 1, 2017

Hello Fabulous GLSEN-neers,

Happy Asian Pacific Heritage Month! As we are leading into the month there is a list of GLSEN resources listed in the "Dip into GLSEN's History" section. We are also in the beginning of our National Teacher Appreciation Week campaign. Sending love and care to the amazing educators in our network!

Updates from Field:

Accreditation Applications: Accreditation Applications opened last week! We sent out the applications along with instructions on how to go about filling them out over the next month. The due date for applications is June 4th. We have also loaded FY17 documents into your Chapter Google Shared drive to help you in filling out the applications.

Our model part 1 document is available to use as a reference guide on how Chapters have answered the questions in the past and can be viewed here.

The Field and Chapter Finance Teams will be hosting a webinar on May 4th from 6-7pm ET, to address budgeting and the rest of the application. If you would like to join us please register here.

If you have further questions Field staff and the Accreditation Review Committee are here to support you throughout the process. Email Chapters@glsen.org with any questions that you may have.

Race and Privilege Committee Survey: GLSEN’s Race & Privilege Committee – a team of GLSEN members whose aim is to embody an organizational model for the intersection of racial and LGBTQ identities, support diverse leadership, and promote inclusive practices.

In supporting our vision, the Race & Privilege Committee is asking chapter leadership to engage in a short questionnaire about your Chapter. The questions ask about your Chapter’s racial demographics, engagement in diversity initiatives, current organizational partnerships, barriers to inclusivity, and ways in which the R&P Committee can support your work. We encourage Chapter leadership teams to discuss the questions before having at least one member from your team submit your answers. All answers will be anonymous. You can find the questionnaire here. Please review with your boards and have returned by May 31st.

Chapter Leadership Institute:

Each year we put out a programming questionnaire on what folks in the Network want to learn at the summer’s Chapter Leadership Institute. Fill out the questionnaire and help make this years CLI the best one yet. We’ll close the questionnaire down on May 12.

Volunteer Information: As we are encouraging you to know the makeup of the communities you serve, we are working towards reflecting on the makeup of our Chapter Network. We want to learn more about the identities of you as a volunteer and how your differences contribute to our community. This collection is part of our reflection as a Network and how we can continue to work towards inclusivity and appreciate the differences that already compose our Chapters. This should take no longer than 5 min of your time! Click here to access the form and if you can make sure to nudge the rest of your Chapter Board to fill it out as well.

Field Services Job Opening: We just opened the application for the open Field Services Manager position. Please circulate the job description to those who may want to apply.

In the Homework Folder section below, there are action steps. If you would like to jump down to the bottom, click the sidebar that says Homework Folder.

Those who attended the Atlanta T.O.T should have received information on the status of your certification. If you have any further questions please email educators@glsen.org.

Policy: GLSEN's Policy Department and the Advancement Project partnered on a webinar for Chapters. The webinar focused on GLSEN's released report, Educational Exclusion: Drop Out, Push Out, and the School-to-Prison Pipeline, detailing how frequently and severely LGBTQ students receive school discipline. It shows that LGBTQ students experience a disproportionate share of school discipline, which can lead to increasing absences, drop outs, or even interaction with the juvenile justice system.The webinar refreshed chapters on GLSEN research, and dug into some of the solutions that GLSEN and partners in the field of juvenile justice are proposing for schools. GLSEN’s national staff was joined by Dwanna Nicole, Director of Policy and Stakeholder Outreach at the Advancement Project, a civil rights organization working to reform school discipline. Dwanna discussed work at the local and state level to reform school discipline policy, and talked about ways that Chapters can join in on the work.

Development: Our annual Respect Awards- New York is coming up on May 15th. We will be honoring Ann Clark as educator of the year, and Roland Park Elementary/Middle School from Baltimore, Maryland as our GSA of the year. You can follow the festivities online at #RepectNY.

Thank you to Del Ray from GLSEN Tennessee for being promoted in one of our direct mailings in support of our fundraising efforts!

Campaign Check Ins

Day of Silence: For this years Day of Silence, the call to action was to encourage to write a letter to their governor calling on them to protect trans students. The call to action was released on the Day of Silence with a guide on how to talk to decision makers. Even though the day has passed we still have the campaign open and are encouraging folks to continue to message their Governors.

National School Climate Survey: Last week we launched the 2017 National School Climate Survey (NSCS) data collection! WOOHOO! The Research team put together the first-ever Chapter guide in promoting the NSCS. There’s some great information in it including how to do outreach to other organizations and do’s/don’ts when promoting the school climate survey. As a reminder, the more qualified responses you get in your state, the higher the likelihood you’ll get a State Snapshot!

If you have upcoming events with youth (i.e. youth pride, youth summits, etc) please email chapters@glsen.org so we can get you NSCS stickers for distribution!

The entire suite of graphics and guide can be found in the Google Drive, or below:

Thank A Teacher: It’s high fundraising time and we’re excited to offer an opportunity for your Chapter to raise funds while thanking educators in your area! Building on last year’s partnership with Teleflora, we’re offering individual purchasing URL's for each Chapter to offer your constituents. Although Teacher Appreciation week is from May 8-12, however we'll only receive proceeds from May 1-12, so promote now!

Graphics for social, web and email were distributed in the Chapters Facebook group. Also in the Facebook group, you will find the spreadsheet for every Chapter's unique purchasing URL that'll auto-populate the 20% discount and also the way we can track the purchase to your Chapter. Once you have your Chapters link, push that out to folks to purchase the "Be Happy Bouquet."

Entering the resource library! This section will be filled with helpful resources that you can check out, and will hopefully be helpful in your personal and Chapter growth.

Racial and Social Justice Resources

We will be including racial and social justice resources that will be our section to continually support Chapters in looking at the work through an intersectional lens. If you have any articles, podcasts, or videos that have helped you in thinking about anti-oppression, please send it to us at Chapters@glsen.org, with the subject line “Racial and Social Justice Resources.”

The Policy Department partnered with the Advancement Project to talk about the school to prison pipeline. The Advancement project has several resources that focus on intersections of racial justice and the LGBTQ movement. Here are a few of their useful resources to think about how GLSEN’s work intersects.

This section is to help spread knowledge and wisdom across Chapters. In efforts to resource share and help solve each other's gaps in knowledge, we are asking for you to submit resources that have worked in helping your Chapter move forward at the local level.

We don’t have a resource from Chapters this month but we do have something that might help meeting with Chapters across the country a little bit easier. In office we have been using Zoom, which can be used as video and web conferencing. It’s free for Chapters to set up. It can be used for board meetings, SHINE teams, etc.

All of the resources shared will be located in the Chapter Google Shared drive after they are included in the newsletter, here.

A Dip Into GLSEN History

There are numerous GLSEN resources that are within the depths of the website.

May is Asian Pacific American Heritage month. This month's resource is all of our resources that center around Asian Pacific Islander voices.